Argus Directorates Post, Antollio's Office — Evening
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The tea had been poured fresh this time, and for once, both of them actually drank it.
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"You've redecorated," Gluttony said, glancing around at the shelves lining Antollio's office, stacked floor to ceiling with files, trinkets, and one small, framed photograph she didn't recognize tucked into the corner of his desk. "Last time I was in here, this whole wall was empty."
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"I've been keeping myself busier lately." Antollio set his cup down with a soft, precise clink. "You'd be amazed how much paperwork a single Eye generates, once it's actually in your possession."
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"Bureaucracy. How romantic."
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"Isn't it, though?" Antollio smiled, folding his hands. "Now, only a few left to find..."
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"I've had my people asking around." Gluttony turned her cup slowly between two fingers. "Old DaeSyndicate contacts and a few Coalitions that owe me a few favors. Nothing solid yet. Whispers, mostly. My best lead was on a merchant in the 2nd claiming to have handled 'something old and golden' a few years back. He got it from a Qianren records-keeper who seemed very quiet."
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"Qianren." Antollio's smile didn't move, but something behind his eyes shifted, faint and considering. "Heng Jing's family does love collecting things... Don't they?"
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"You think they've got one?"
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"I think it would be terribly convenient if they didn't, and terribly inconvenient if they did." He sipped his tea, unhurried. "We'll find out eventually. Everything in the Ring finds its way to me, given enough patience and enough people willing to dig for it."
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"You're taking this all remarkably calmly," Gluttony said, watching him over the rim of her cup. "Considering everything our kids have gone through, Antollio. The one with the contract with Gun seems to have both found and eliminated that Adjunct's secret weapon against the Ring. And here you sit, sipping tea."
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"What would you have me do instead? Panic?" Antollio's smile widened, easy and warm, though something underneath it had gone very still. "Panicking rarely accomplishes anything. I find it far more productive to simply adjust and continue."
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"And the report?" Gluttony asked, quieter now. "Someone's going to want the full account of what happened down there. Eventually. In detail."
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Antollio was quiet for a moment, turning his cup slowly on its saucer.
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"Vance isn't going to like hearing this one," he said, mild as ever.
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The name landed in the room the way a stone lands in still water, small and quiet and rippling out further than its size had any right to.
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"The Grey Death," Gluttony said, carefully. "You're reporting to him directly, now?"
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"Since the Argus Directorates Post was a mere concept. He started all this. This office you see here used to belong to him, actually. I report to him regardless of whether I'd like to." Antollio's eyes, for just a moment, caught the low candlelight and held it, gold bleeding faint and steady into the color, an unhurried, unsettling warmth spreading across his face that had nothing at all to do with the tea between them. "He won't like hearing about Mori." The smile stayed exactly where it was, perfectly pleasant, perfectly wrong. "Or, should I say, what he's become."
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"You almost sound like you're going to do it anyway."
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"Oh? Do I?" His eyes settled back to their usual warm brown, the gold fading as easily as it had arrived, and the smile he offered her afterward was, somehow, exactly as unsettling as the one it replaced. "Perhaps that's for the best."
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Gluttony didn't press further. She'd known him long enough to recognize the particular shape of a conversation that had already reached its natural end, whether or not either of them had said everything worth saying.
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"To old times," she said instead, raising her cup.
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"To old times," Antollio agreed, and they drank.
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Scrapyard Heap — Night
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The tune started the way it always started, low and unhurried, three instruments finding each other in the dark one note at a time before the baton gave them somewhere to go.
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Cembalo sat at the harpsichord, silver brace gleaming faintly in the lantern light, his prosthetic hand moving across the keys with a precision that made the missing arm feel, for a few measures at a time, like nothing worth mourning at all. Beside him, Viol traded between violin and viola in the same restless, showman's rhythm he brought to everything else, swapping instruments mid-phrase without ever quite losing the thread of the melody underneath. Across from them both, Tromm Petey sat with a trombone in one massive hand and a trumpet in the other, alternating between them every few bars with a patience that looked, on a man his size, almost impossibly delicate.
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Kopf Dirigent stood at the center of it all, baton raised, guiding the whole strange, mismatched ensemble through a piece that had no proper name, only the shape it took whenever the four of them found themselves with nothing better to do than play it.
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He stopped them with a single, small motion of his wrist.
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The music died away, one instrument at a time, until only the low hum of Scrapyard Heap's distant furnace fires remained.
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"Somethin' wrong?" Viol asked, viola still tucked under his chin.
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"No." Dirigent lowered the baton slowly, his gaze drifting toward the far window, toward the dim glow of the Ring's upper Districts sitting somewhere beyond Scrapyard Heap's iron walls. "I felt something. That's all."
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[What kind of something?] Tromm signed, setting the trumpet down.
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"The bad kind." Dirigent's expression had gone distant. "A storm, gathering somewhere in the higher Districts. I can see the shape of it now, pressing at the edges of the Ring's walls, screaming in a relentless agony."
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"You're gettin' poetic on us, Kopf," Viol said, though there was no real humor behind it.
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"I've earned the right to." Dirigent set the baton down on the table beside him, unhurried. "The Argus Directorates are closer to their goal than they realize. Closer than most of the Ring realizes, I'd wager. Every step they take toward those Eyes is a step toward danger."
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"You worried about the boy?" Viol asked. "Ryunosuke?"
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"I'm considering him," Dirigent said, which wasn't quite the same thing, though he let the distinction pass unremarked. "I think he's going to become something this Ring badly needs, whether he understands that about himself yet or not. A light... Not just the kind that chases the dark for a while before burning out." For a moment, his eyes held something almost fond beneath their usual careful composure. "...The kind that can remove the fear of the darkness from any soul."
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Nobody answered that directly. Cembalo's fingers had gone still over the harpsichord's keys, his gaze drifting down to the silver brace along his own wrist, to the place where a thin, tarnished ring had sat for longer than he cared to properly count before he'd finally let it go into someone else's keeping.
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I hope it serves him better than it ever served me, Cembalo thought, watching his own reflection in the harpsichord's dark, polished wood. I hope... through whatever storm's coming his way... that ring will still be worth something to him when it finally arrives.
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Viol leaned back in his chair, viola resting loose across his knee, a small, private smile tugging at one corner of his mouth.
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Kid took my second blade off me without even meanin' to, he thought. Taught me somethin' about fightin' with one hand that Cembalo never managed to teach me in three years of tryin'. Wouldn't mind another round with him, once he's had time to grow into whatever he's gonna grow into. Might actually be a fair fight, next time.
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Tromm Petey couldn't think of anything to say about the Directorates or the Bashnya like the others did, not exactly, but something in him turned, slow and wordless, toward the direction of the great scrap-metal gate standing at the edge of the settlement, the same gate six exhausted strangers had walked through months ago and, eventually, walked back out of considerably more whole than they had any right to be.
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He watched it a long while, saying nothing at all, and eventually, without any further prompting, lifted the trombone back to his lips.
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Dirigent raised his baton again, and the four of them found their way back into the melody, one note at a time, the same resolute, unnamed tune drifting out into the dark, past the furnace fires, past the sleeping settlement, toward a storm none of them could see yet, but all of them, in their own quiet ways, had already begun bracing for.
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Rotary Eleven Epicenter, King McGee's Office — Night
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The report came from the hands of a young Spine Fist, barely out of his initiation, standing at rigid attention in front of King's desk with the particular nervous energy of someone still working out exactly how much personality he was allowed to have in front of a superior officer.
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"Smoke Shot, sir. Word came down from our contacts in the 7th. Yo. The Argus Directorates secured one." He shifted his weight. "An Eye. Of Argus. The whole hundred-Eyes thing everybody's startin' to whisper about."
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King, boot propped up on his desk, cigar burning slow between two fingers, didn't look up right away.
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"That so."
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"Yes, sir. Figured you'd wanna know, given, uh." The Fist hesitated. "Given how the Spine's usually real interested in anybody collectin' anything that powerful, yo."
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"Don't worry about it." King finally glanced up, unhurried, something warm and tired behind his usual easy grin. "Leave 'em be."
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"...Sir?"
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"Argus Directorates. The Eyes. All of it." He waved one hand, loose, dismissive, though nothing about his voice actually sounded dismissive underneath it. "Ain't our fight right now. Got bigger matters sittin' on my plate than a hundred old trinkets scattered across the Ring, and I don't much feel like spreadin' myself thin chasin' after somethin' that ain't botherin' nobody yet."
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The Fist blinked, clearly having expected a considerably longer conversation, and settled for a stiff nod instead. "...Understood, sir. I'll pass that along."
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"You do that." King's grin came back, easy as ever, though it didn't quite reach the rest of his face. "Good work bringin' it to me straight, though. Keep that up."
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The Fist left with visible relief, the office door clicking shut behind him, and King sat a long while in the quiet afterward, cigar burning down toward his fingers, staring at nothing in particular.
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"You still there?" he asked, finally, to the empty room.
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~ Where else would I be? ~ Circle of Fire's voice curled up warm from somewhere behind his ribs, familiar now in a way that had settled in faster than he'd expected it to. ~ I don't exactly have anywhere else to go, McGee. ~
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"Fair point." He turned his palm over, watching a small flame spread across his hand before it died down immediately, an old habit Montserrat used to have. One that Smoke Shot had inherited now. "Can I ask you somethin'?"
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~ Of course, Smoke. ~
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"This thing I'm doin'. Lettin' the Eyes slide, keepin' the Spine's nose outta Argus business, puttin' every ounce of what I got left into gettin' Monty outta that hole instead of chasin' after somethin' that might actually matter to the whole Ring." He exhaled slow, watching the smoke curl up toward the ceiling. "Is that the right call? Or am I just tellin' myself it's the right call, 'cause it's the one that lets me sleep easier at night?"
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He waited.
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The warmth behind his ribs stayed exactly where it was, banked low and steady, offering nothing at all.
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"...Yeah," King said. "Figured you might say that."
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He sat with the silence a while longer, cigar finally burning down to nothing between his fingers, and didn't reach for a second one from his tin.
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4th District, an Unlit Alley — Late Night
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A man had been singing since somewhere around his seventh beer, and he hadn't gotten any better at it since.
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"—and the LADY said to MEEE," he warbled, weaving sideways into a stack of crates and correcting course with the exaggerated dignity of a man who was extremely confident he wasn't as drunk as he was, "you can KEEP your Nanum, hun, I've got—I've got—"
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He forgot the next line entirely, laughed at himself for it, and kept walking.
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The alley he'd chosen was a shortcut he took most nights on his way home, narrow, poorly lit, flanked on both sides by the shuttered backs of shops that had closed hours ago. He'd walked it a hundred times drunker than this and never once thought twice about it.
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He thought twice about it now, when he looked up mid-verse and found someone standing at the alley's far end who hadn't been there a second ago.
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A man, tall and unhurried, a purple newsboy hat sitting low over his eyes, a thick gold chain wound several times around his left forearm, catching what little light the alley could cast his way. He wasn't moving. He wasn't doing anything at all, except standing there, watching.
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"...Evenin'," the drunk man tried, unsteady, some old animal instinct finally cutting through the haze enough to make him nervous. "Didn't, uh. Didn't see you there."
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The man in the purple hat lifted one hand and flicked his fingers, lazy, almost bored.
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The air in front of him tore open.
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A ring of swirling, deep violet light bloomed into existence a few feet off the ground, crackling faintly at its edges, and out of it stepped two more figures, unhurried, as though stepping through a hole torn in the world was simply how they preferred to walk through doors.
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The first had short brown hair that looked like a psycho cut it, and he wore a pair of purple sunglasses with the darkest purple lenses that wouldn't even let him see in an alley this dark, a massive scythe slung across his back, its curved blade lined with a thin, pulsing strip of purple neon that hummed faintly.
The second was harder to make out, buried under a heavy raincoat and a low, deep hood, hands tucked into his pockets; nothing visible of him at all except the vague shape of a person and their unsettling stillness.
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"H-Hey, now," the drunk man managed, backing up until he hit the alley wall behind him, all traces of song gone from his voice entirely. "I-I don't want no trouble...! I'm just headin' home, I—!"
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The man in the purple hat pulled out a phone, tapped it once, and turned the screen toward him. His voice came out low, restrained, slightly rough-edged, but calm.
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"That's you, right?"
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His name. His address. His age. A photograph, clearly taken sometime in the last week, of him walking this exact route.
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"Wh—?!" His mouth went dry. "How do you—? Who ARE you people?!"
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The one with the sunglasses laughed, low and genuinely delighted, and crouched down to the man's level with the easy, unhurried grace of someone who had absolutely nowhere else he needed to be.
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"Us?" He tilted his head, his grin widening beneath the purple lenses that fell to his nose, letting the man look deep into his eyes.
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Spirals.
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His eyes were purple spirals that spun on a black canvas.
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Finally, the man with the spiraled eyes spoke.
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"We're the Three Musketeers, pal."
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The figure in the raincoat drew both hands from his pockets.
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Two heavy Desert Eagles, dull steel catching the alley's thin light, one in each fist, had been sitting there the entire time.
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The man didn't have time to scream.
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Both shots rang out at once, sharp and final, swallowed almost instantly by the alley's narrow walls, and by the time the echo finished dying, the only sound left behind it was the low, patient hum of a scythe's neon edge, and the soft, unhurried click of a portal folding itself shut, taking all three of them with it, back into wherever they'd come from.
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Three posters were left on the body, crinkled and partly torn.
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WANTED:
Script — Death Spinner
- DEAD or ALIVE -
₦540,000,000
A member of the Three Musketeers. No one outside his crew has ever seen his face. He is known for wearing disguises on operations, but he's never revealed who he is. He wields two Desert Eagles, using ammunition techniques from the Gunsmith Office.
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WANTED:
Garamond — Violet Rift
- DEAD or ALIVE -
₦510,000,000
A member of the Three Musketeers. Most notable features are his bright purple hat and the gold chains wrapped around his left arm. He has medium-length black hair and black eyes. He can open rifts/portals to any location on Earth, including the Dead Zone. He wields an infantry rifle as his weapon of choice, using ammunition techniques from the Gunsmith Office.
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WANTED:
Haesche — Velvet Stagnation
- DEAD or ALIVE -
₦495,000,000
A member of the Three Musketeers. He has short brown hair and often wears purple sunglasses to cover his eyes, which have been heavily affected by exposure to the ARCH "Uzu-Hoku-Nacci," turning his sclerae pitch black and making his irises and pupils purple and constantly spinning. He is able to summon purple chains from thin air that can grab and attach to anything.
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ADJUNCT-13 ARC - END